Looking further into the events surrounding the 9/11 attack, Kean and his commission discovered lots of discrepancies. For one, scores of families affected by the attack were also finding it difficult to get answers to their growing lists of questions. The commission could not get either President Bush or Vice President Dick Cheney to testify; the commission could only hear from witnesses who echoed the government’s version of events.

And since it was created by the administration, many felt it was summarily being controlled by it as well. As former Reagan economist Paul Craig Roberts pointed out, the panel was more a political operation rather than an entity truly charged with finding out what happened and how, “Its membership consisted of former politicians. No knowledgeable experts were appointed to the commission,” he said.

One commission member – himself a former politician – became so tired of being hamstrung during the panel’s investigation he wound up quitting. Former U.S. Sen. Max Cleland of Georgia, in responding to constraints placed on the commission, said, “If this decision stands, I, as a member of the commission, cannot look any American in the eye, especially family members of victims, and say the commission had full access. This investigation is now compromised.” He left shortly thereafter.

That said, neither Cleland nor the commission ever said they believed that 9/11 was a government conspiracy or some sort of inside job. Yet they questioned how the media and others never came to wonder aloud why the panel believed they were lied to by Pentagon and FAA officials, and even why it took so long for the White House to even agree to form a commission in the first place.

Because when you stop and consider the event itself, it seems impossible, that a handful of Arab plotters could, in the day and age of electronic security, could manage to outwit the CIA, the FBI, the National Security Agency and the various Defense Department intelligence apparatuses. Further disturbing is thatno onewas demanding loudly and publicly to know how that could happen.

A d v e r t i s e m e n t

In the years since, a number of groups have formed in an effort to find out more about what happened on 9/11 and events and circumstances leading up to it. One group is comprised of about 1,500 structural and other engineers who question[2] the government’s official version of how WTC Building 7 actually collapsed, just as an example.

Other groups want to know how it was possible to be duped so completely by plotting terrorists. Still others want to know why it is we should trust the government to be completely right about everything surrounding the 9/11 attacks when the same government got everything so wrong prior to the attacks.

Finally, during the course of its investigation the 9/11 commission discovered that in the years before the attacks, key suspects had been identified by some spy agencies that were actually tracking a few of them.

But overall, the commission found that the various agencies throughout government which share missions often did not shareinformation, including information about some of these very bad people who had very bad intentions towards the U.S.

The failure among government intelligence agencies in sharing information remains a problem today.

“Despite the best efforts of the 9/11 commission and other intelligence reformers, budgetary authority over intelligence remains unaligned with substantive responsibility. Turf battles persist among intelligence agencies. Power is sought while responsibility is deflected.

There is no substantive evidence to suggest there was some sort of elaborate “black op” that took place with government assistance to stage the attacks so as to justify the perpetual state of war we have engaged in since, or the worsening state of civil liberties at home that have been justified in the name of “increasing homeland security.”

If there is “evidence” of anything, it could be just as simple as a government trying to cover up its own incompetence, rather than admit there are structural problems among the bureaucracy charged with protecting the country.

How refreshing it would be to have leaders who are willing to publicly identify and take responsibility for such problems, then proceed to fix them with haste and transparency.

After a decade of seemingly never-ending warfare which has drained our treasury, strained our military, threatened our constitutional civil liberties and worsened our standing in the world, isn’t about time – 10 years later – that our government came clean,really clean, about the defining event of our time?

This is Part II of a two-part series examining 9/11 on the 10-year anniversary of the worst terrorist attack in American history.

[7] As the 9/11 anniversary approaches, does the government still have questions to answer? (Part I): http://www.prisonplanet.com/as-the-911-anniversary-approaches-does-the-government-still-have-questions-to-answer-part-i.html

[9] Government Fines & Harassment For People Who Refuse To Answer Intrusive Survey Questions: http://www.prisonplanet.com/government-fines-harassment-for-people-who-refuse-to-answer-intrusive-survey-questions.html

[10] Can You Answer 25 Difficult Questions That The Mainstream Media Does Not Seem To Have Answers To?: http://www.prisonplanet.com/can-you-answer-25-difficult-questions-that-the-mainstream-media-does-not-seem-to-have-answers-to.html